Harvey Rempel knows Winnipeg’s inner city well.
Working with Inner City Youth Alive, Rempel connects with youth and helps people involved in gangs or a life of crime find a positive path.
“Getting to know guys who were caught up in the world of gangs and drug dealing, it just captured my heart and I’ve been immersed in it ever since,” Rempel told Global News. “Honestly, I often feel honoured to be building relationships with the youth.”
Rempel says he wants to see the next leaders of this province take action through addressing the housing and addictions crisis.
“I think many of these men and women, especially the young men that are gang involved. Every time they get released they almost always have no solid safe, secure housing to return to that isn’t a trap house or an apartment block that has been taken over by a gang. Then you get pulled back into that world very very quickly.”
Rempel’s work connecting with the community has helped in times of crisis. He has been able to help facilitate negotiations between fighting gangs, helping them find common ground.
“I remember some years ago there was two groups of guys that were fighting with each other and kicking in each others doors with bear mace and baseball bats and machetes,” he said.
“We actually knew both sides, so we were able to kind of have a sit down meeting with pizza and give them a chance to express their anger in a neutral space. And told them – everybody talks about rep the north side, rep the west side. And do that, rep it. But rep it in a way that builds up the community, not tear it down.”
Rempel has seen the toll the violence has taken on the community, first-hand.
“We’ve been leading and attending quite a few more funerals in the last few years. Especially for people who died of overdoses and victims of violence,” Rempel said.
“Good people, people that we love, that we miss, people that were a huge part of this community.”
In 2022, Winnipeg had a record level of homicides with 53 people losing their lives to violent crime. Many advocates, including Rempel, say at the core of it, is a mental health, addictions, and housing crisis.
“It’s scary to think what it would be if it wasn’t for the many different people that are passionate and compassionate and working hard to try and be there for the youth in our city,” Rempel said.
Kent Dueck, the executive director and founder of Inner City Youth, has been advocating for change to address the violent levels of crime, something he notes is rising not just in Winnipeg, but nationally.
And is having an impact on families, businesses, and the greater community.
“I’ve recently talked to a store owner who had so many break-ins and so much crime, that their solution was to just be open 24-7, because if they ever close the doors, somebody would just break-in,” Dueck said.
“You see everyone responding, but its sort of like a powerless response. Because if the law still stands where these violent offenders continue to be released, then everyone is just doing their best until that massive hole in the boat is plugged we’re just going to continue bailing water.”
He also says the violence has a cascading effect in the community.
“I was recently driving down Salter Avenue and this woman was just about accosted with a baseball bat, she just got caught in the middle of something. So I picked her up and dropped her off at work. So then she’s got this trauma to debrief,” Dueck said.
“So if you think about it, you’ve got a handful of individuals committing these crimes, there’s all these victims behind these crimes. In my mind, the victims in this story are nothing more than lab rats in some giant social experiment. It just feels like no one cares about the victims.”
Dueck says something needs to change, and it needs to happen quickly.
“We’re at an inflection point. We’re at a critical point and if we don’t take action, we can’t even imagine the implications of our failure to act on this. So we have to reverse our direction on this,” he said.
“There’s a lot darker things could get if we don’t recognize that we’ve made mistakes in the way we’ve written these laws and return to some sort of sanity.”
Dueck says he wants to see steps taken to stabilize the current situation, before finding longer-term solutions. And part of that, he says, involves listening to victims.
“We need to act quickly. Because what’s happening is politicians are sitting in air-conditioned offices, taking their sweet time making decisions that matter to people in our community, matter to those victims,” he said.
“I think it’s critically important that we begin to listen to victims and listen carefully. Listen to the wisdom within the community and then stabilize the situation. You can’t build vision when a community feels unsafe. If everybody is looking over their shoulder, it’s very hard to look forward with vision.”
Impact on victims takes a ripple effect
Karen Wiebe, the executive director of the Manitoba Organization for Victim Assistance, points to the spike in crime in Winnipeg in recent years.
“There is a lot of violence, a lot of violence by young people in particular, and it’s very concerning,” Wiebe told Global News. “It’s very concerning to see children as young as 14 and 15-years-old involved in homicides. It’s concerning to see the level of violence and anger.”
Wiebe’s son, T.J., was murdered in 2003 when he was just 20 years old. She says each time victims hear of another homicide, it triggers old trauma. She says that applies to her as well.
“Every time there’s a murder it brings back their own murder, it brings back the murder of their family member,” she said. “So it is also traumatizing for people who have also been through this to see this happening again and again and again in their own city.”
Wiebe says they have seen more and more people reaching out for support to their organization in recent years.
“Dealing with the courts, dealing with police, trying to understand the systems, and doing all of that from a place where you’re in shock, disbelief, sadness, incredible sadness, and trying to figure things out. It’s just a nightmare for a family to try and go through this,” she said.
“The effects of a homicide are not something that goes away in six months or a year or two years or ten years sometimes. We have on our roster (someone) we’re still meeting with that had somebody murdered 25 years ago, so it’s cumulative.”
She also says while she wants to see the next government take action on crime prevention, she always wants to see more in place for victim supports.
“Victims are largely forgotten in the process. I mean the crime is committed against Canada, it’s not committed against Karen Wiebe because my son was murdered, it’s committed against Canada and Karen Wiebe is kind of incidental in the process,” Wiebe said.
“We don’t have any say in the trial, we don’t have any say in a plea bargain. They might ask our opinion, but that doesn’t mean that we have to abide by it.”